Icebroken
by Nozomi
Summary: Hiead's motivation. The reasons everyone looks for, but can never understand.


Author: Nozomi Aru  
  
Pairings: none.   
  
Rating: PG to PG-13  
  
Archive: FF.net, Isle of View (http://www.geocities.com/empressminako), anyone who wants it (just ask, though I don't know why you would. *sigh*)  
  
Disclaimers: "Goodbye To You" is copyright Michelle Branch. The lyrics were used without permission. Hiead Gner and GOA are copyright Yukiru Sugisaki. Again, used without permission.   
  
Author's Note: Ergh… Um… Hiead. Scary. ^.^; I have NO idea where this came from. I was sort of trying to explain Hiead's past, and his motivation to become a Pilot (in my own imaginings, of course), but somehow it didn't turn out that way. This is un-beta-ed, so any comments would be appreciated. ^.^  
  
  
  
  
  
**

Icebroken

**  
  
The streets of the colony were crowded with beggars, passersby and other sorts of ilk at this time in the artificial day, and he sneered in disgust at the sight of them all, the action hidden within the darkened confines of the rustic, earth-brown cloak that billowed around his lithe frame. Unconsciously, his right hand clenched into a fist and his fingernails bit into the skin of his palm, drawing half-moon circlets of blood as the sharp laughter of those around him pierced his skin as thoroughly as a knife through softened butter.  
  
Fools. Idiots, all of them. Naïve, unthinking, insignificant idiots. He hated them. He hated them all. Their laughter, their smiles, even their tears; he absolutely _despised_ it all.  
  
Weak.  
  
He was not weak. He wasn't brought up to be weak. _That_ flaw had been thoroughly beaten out of his mind a long time ago, but not physically. Never physically.  
  
There were things in this life much worse than physically punishment.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
A dingy, dirtied hand brushed against his cloth-covered elbow; a plaintive whine for money reached his meticulous hearing. He resisted the urge to turn and slap the pathetic girl; no need to waste his energy on someone like her. She wasn't worth his time.  
  
He was waiting. They had not told him to do any such thing when They had cast him to these vile streets, but the feeling was inherent to his very being. He was waiting for something; for someone or something to make its move. He didn't know what; he didn't need to. It was looming, and they would move in sync, as he had been dutifully trained for before the Break.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
A small crowd had gathered around one street corner, and he cast a hating, blood red gaze as he passed with his usual silence of the wind.  
  
It was another girl; this one perched on a small stool with an old, worn string instrument clutched in her too-slim hands. A simple melody floated up from the object as she strummed a hand across it, tentative smile growing just that much wider as random members of her audience tossed small change into the weather-beaten fedora hat lying in front of her.   
  
"~Of all the things I've believed in  
I just want to get it over with  
Tears form behind my eyes  
But I do not cry  
Count it in the days that pass me by  
  
I've been searching deep down in my soul  
Words that I'm hearing are starting to get old  
Feels like I'm starting all over again  
The last three years were just pretend…~"  
  
He snorted as what sounded like an oldEarth melody faded behind him, dying like the last stubborn embers of a burned-out fire. Pathetic. Everyone was pathetic. Everyone relied on someone else for their well-being.   
  
He relied on no one. He had spilt blood times before to get what he wanted, and he'd do it again, though not happily.  
  
Happiness was not something he felt. Ever. Rage, anger, superiority, madness; those he was familiar with. Those he could twist and deform to be used to his advantage, and he did so regularly. All others were insignificant and meaningless, unless one happened to enjoy being brought down.  
  
He enjoyed bringing others down.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The boy passed by a darkened alley, and in his mind he heard the click of a gun, the sharp intake of breath in a gasp, the roar of the shot in his ears, the sluggish dripping of blood as the warm fluid ran down his arms and hands to splatter on the mist-dampened ground. The memory of his heavy, panic-labored breathing caused his throat to constrict of his own will, and a hand instinctively darted to hover possessively over the stolen wallet he carried on his person; his only possession besides the clothes on his back and the long-forgotten gun he had dropped on that night.  
  
His memories were his own personal Hell. They were the sole things he couldn't inflict upon others to break them. It was really too bad.  
  
He could still see that room, the room where They had brought him, and the other for a time; the bleak white room where they had taught him everything and nothing at all, where they had trained him and raised him; if, indeed, what had been done to him could be so termed as 'raising' someone.  
  
It was where They had brought him at the last, and battered him over and over with the words they had believed him too docile to grasp, as They argued among themselves, oblivious to him as if he was nothing but a breathing statue; after all, he was nothing but one venture out of all- an important venture, no less, but only one. A puppet in Their little games, for which they though him too unmotivated in that area to grasp.  
  
Then They had cast him off, and it had been the end of what he emotionlessly termed 'Genesis'; The Beginning. It was the only beginning for him, and he despised it as he despised all things above and around him, even as it was ingrained into his very senses; something never forgotten, for it was utterly impossible for him to forget even the smallest moment.  
  
Had They known that whatever They tried to bring him to, he could not stray from this path, anymore than he could live without air? He would never know, and They had left no clues in their silent wake.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Artificial daylight had slowly filtered away, bestowing reign upon artificial darkness; a mirror of his soul, he supposed. A bare shadow of it- twisted- but a mirror nonetheless. A reflection of something too darkened to reflect properly, only dark enough to cast shadows.   
  
The laughter and smiles had died down, as if dampened and smothered by his heart. And still he walked.  
  
The time was approaching; he could feel it in his blood so heated by malice, racing through his veins like poison shards of ice. The two who were like him and as him would be there, and one would need to be dealt with, for the steel ice in his core would not be overcome by the one he barely remember, but could still feel.  
  
The pungent stench of rotting garbage wafted to his nostrils as he paused before a dimly lit, tiny building, causing his nose to crinkle in utter distaste.  
  
Then, only then, did that feeling that was him and yet so different make him step up and shove the door open. It was time.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The old wooden door creaked in irritated anguish as he pushed it open and stepped inside, the hood of his cloak shifting to fall lightly back against his shoulder at the gust of wind allowing the door to slam shut caused. A new, musty smell attacked his senses as he automatically strode towards a shadowed part of the room, plucking a single sheet of thin, pale pink paper from where it lay on a careworn desk. His eyes scanned the type mechanically, somehow already knowing was it was going to say.  
  


_**Goddess Operation Academy Enrollment Form**_

  
  
GOA. Where he had been heading all along; the place he had been born to attend, could not escape.  
  
Did not want to.  
  
His blood-red gaze fell to the next line of type, and the corner of his mouth twitched inadvertently.  
  


_NAME: _________________

  
  
Name. Did he- born to fight, born to _win_- even have a name?  
  
None that he could recall.  
  
_~REI~_  
  
Unthinkingly, his hand wormed it's way into the stolen wallet, tips of his fingers coming into contact with cold metal.  
  
No, not a gun, or a bullet. Something else.  
  
He pulled it out, hearing the- almost indiscernible- clink of silver chain against hard steel plate.  
  
A bracelet.  
  
No.  
  
A _claim_; long-dead yet not forgotten.  
  
Pads of nimble fingers brushed across the once-familiar engraving, traced the lettering forged into its making- cold rage welling up at the sight.  
  
But this was his answer.  
  
_'O3 – GNR'_  
  
And the hated past once again affected his superior future, for that was all he could now feel.  
  
He smirked and pressed down on the sheet of paper with a pen procured from the empty coffee cup in the corner of the desk.  
  


_NAME:  
  
... Hiead Gner_

  
  
  
  
--  
  
  
  
  
Nozomi: *pokes it with a stick* I think I killed it…  
  
Threnody: I dunno, I'm all for the "kick it 'till you KNOW it's down" attitude.  
  
Nozomi: No, I really think it's dead. *shudders* It's evil. *pokes it some more*  
  
  
C&C, anyone? ^.^ 


End file.
